In August 2014, Emma will embark on an incredible journey and run from the west coast of Namibia to the east coast of Mozambique (4,000km).
Her organiser, Aysha explains more about this incredible adventure:
“15 months ago we went to Banff Outdoor film festival and there were no films about outdoor adventurous women. Emma told me that she had run across South Africa, running a marathon a day for 2 months. At the time I was working for the SEED project. I asked Emma if she would do it again. Emma agreed providing I organised it.
The plan is for Emma to run from the west coast of Namibia to the east coast of Mozambique, taking in Zimbabwe (where the SEED project is based) and Malawi. Emma intends to run 30 miles a day with one day off a week. We expect the journey to take 3 to 5 months allowing for complications, such as slow border crossings, injury, illness, car breakdown, or roads and villages not being quite where they were expected.
The run will raise money for 3 charities: The SEED Project a small but highly effective development charity; Tusk a conservation charity that supports projects in Namibia, Zimbabwe and Malawi and; Think Plan Do, a charity I am setting up in the UK to provide support and skills to people who want to do something positive in their community.
We wanted every country that we are travelling through to benefit from our journey. We have as yet to find a suitable charity in Niassa, the remote area of Mozambique we will be travelling through. But it may be that something becomes obvious when we get there.
Emma will be accompanied at all times by Michael Whitehurst on a bicycle. I shall be nearby in the support car (Cleopatra) with Lukasz Uzar, mechanic, and Robert Kazunga, SEED Project Manager. Robert will be accompanying us from Namibia to his home village near Karoi, Zimbabwe, in order to assist with meeting people and make sure that we travel in a way that is respectful to local cultures. Robert is the only person to have graduated from university from his village and is both inspirational and very humble. We think that his story will form an essential part of the journey. We will be camping and cooking our food as we go.
Our Water-to-Go filter bottles will be essential as due to the slow speed we will be travelling at, there will be a significant length of time between towns and I have been warned that it will be difficult to get water in some of the areas we are travelling through.
We would like to showcase the journey, the country and the people we meet along the way. The journey will be a big challenge for the whole team, as some have never been beyond Europe before.
There are three reasons for this journey: to raise as much as possible to benefit charities that help make the world happier; to be a positive role model to encourage others to go on adventures; and because it seems like a fun idea.
The journey has already brought us into contact with amazing people and taught us things we would never normally have learned. I didn’t even know how to use a spanner properly or change a tyre, aside from all the social media and technology skills I had to learn.”
Follow the journey at www.HeadoverHeels2014.com or support their great work by donating on Emma’s fundraising page.
